Transcript
Sacha Stone (0:00)
Hi, this is Free Thinking through the Fourth Turning. My name is Sacha Stone. This is part two of a two part series. If you haven't yet heard part one, please go back and read A Terrifying Night in a Good Liberal Town. This is part two. A Democrat's Lonely and Hopeless Thanksgiving Janet was dreading Thanksgiving this year. She dreaded it every year. Holidays made her feel a sense of foreboding. What was coming next, she thought. How much worse could it possibly get? It had been a rough few weeks for Janet and countless other women in the country. She barely remembered election night, except that at some point she'd rooted around in a closet, dug out her ex boyfriend's electric razor, and shaved her head. Did she really shave her head? As she lay in bed, still too depressed to make coffee, she ran a palm over her scalp and felt the stubble. She'd actually done it. She'd shaved it all off. And how could she have forgotten? There was that one morning when she'd stumbled into the market in her bathrobe and was greeted with sympathetic stares by the cashier. No, it wasn't the election they were referring to. They all thought she had cancer. Can I do anything for you, dear? One of them said, touching Janet's arm. You can get me a new president and a better country, janet had snapped back. The woman's face melted from concern to a shared knowing of the tragedy that had just taken place. Janet could see her working it out in her mind. Janet was one of those women who shaved her head after the election. Well, so what? Janet thought as she clutched her robe tightly around her body before ducking back into her house, slamming the door behind her. The only reason she'd gone out was that she'd emptied every wine bottle in the house and now she needed another glass. Yes, it was the morning. No, don't ask her about it. Janet knew that if there was any time to remain permanently drunk, this was it. What a terrible night that was. November 5th. She figured the election would be close, but Rick Wilson had assured her that Trump would lose and lose badly.
Rick Wilson (2:36)
I have a couple of things to think about for tomorrow, everybody. Number one, Trump's gonna lose. He's gonna lose badly. He's gonna be. He's gonna be wrecked. I don't know what the Electoral College count's gonna be at the end of this, but it's going to get loud and it's going to get hard for him. Their panic is extraordinary. Their events in Georgia and North Carolina are basically about as well attended as a Pokemon card trading Convention in Ass Crack, Alabama. This is a campaign in freefall. It's really, really fucked up.
Sacha Stone (3:10)
She'd watch the results come in until she heard the independents flip to Trump in record numbers. That was when her heart sank. Was like watching the needle at the New York Times flip from Hillary winning by 95% to Trump winning by 95%. Now the needles were all pointing Trump's way again. All of the swing states. How could this be happening? After all the ways the Democrats and the media showed the American people how evil and monstrous Trump was. Now she had to wait months for her hair to grow out. What had she done? It had all been a swirling nightmare since November 5th. That night, the night Trump won, she heard music coming from across the street. Skip Taylor, the man she'd had a crush on in high school and apparently a Trump voter, had music playing. It was that song, that YMCA song. He was the one who was supposed to be ruined after November 5th, not her. And as she opened the curtain and peered across the street, she could see him. There he was, shirtless, holding a beer in one hand and his cell phone in the other, filming himself dancing the Trump dance. He still looked good after all these. Suddenly, she saw him notice her through the darkness. She closed the curtain quickly and slid down the wall. It was all too much. She couldn't handle it anymore. She had to do something to show the world how badly they were hurting and that all Americans weren't racists and bigots. And that was when she saw all these women on TikTok shaving their heads with a wild look in their eyes. An act of defiance. Yes, thought Janet, me too. She hurried to the bathroom, mounted her iPhone on the sink and hit record. And as she ran the razor over her scalp, tears streaming down her face, she said what needed to be said. I am not offering myself up to the world anymore, Janet began. The world has turned its back on me, on women and people of color and the LGBTQIA community and. And all for what? Cheaper eggs? So what if mothers and babies desperately cross the border for a better life? Why do these terrible people care? This country is big enough for all of us, especially those who have compassion for all people and all groups and put it on lawn signs in the front yard. This is my testimony. I will be wearing a blue bracelet so all of you will know I wasn't one of those selfish, bigoted, ugly, inside and out white women who voted for that monster. I will also put a safety pin somewhere so that you can see that. But now I have to Go cry. Janet had a vague recollection of having posted that video. Did she? She reached under the covers for her iPhone and tapped on it and then opened the TikTok app and looked at her profile. There it was, for all to see. Yet another woman on TikTok shaving her head after the election. But all it had was 39 views. That was all. No one cared, Janet thought. The few comments that were there were mocking her, laughing at Trump supporters, and even saying Manson girl vibes. Manson, Like Charles Manson? Janet deleted her video. She didn't need to share her feelings with such an uncaring world. It would be days before she could even get out of bed. But eventually she did. What choice did she have? Resistance 2.0, here we go. It would be back to Maddow every night. It would be hanging on every word. From Jojo, from Jerz. It would be leaving Twitter and heading to Blue Sky. It would mean sending money to the Kamala Harris campaign because she will be the nominee in 2028. This fight is not over. She even told all of us on Twitter.